Portrait of Deceit, Part II
Wisconsin’s largest employer organization and state lawmakers are blasting the state Department of Public Instruction for failing to include the business community in its new “Portrait of a Graduate” initiative.
“Once again, the Madison bureaucrats believe that they know what is best for students without engaging those that employ those future workers,” Rachel Ver Velde, Associate Vice President of Government Relations for Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce (WMC), said in an exclusive comment provided to Dairyland Sentinel.
The backlash follows a Dairyland Sentinel report revealing that DPI’s public claims about the initiative do not match the actual makeup of its advisory panel. In a June 1 guest column under her own byline, State Superintendent Jill Underly wrote that the agency “formed a steering committee that includes educators, students, higher education partners, statewide education organizations, employers and industry representatives across Wisconsin to guide this work.”
But public records obtained by Dairyland Sentinel show a completely different reality. Out of the 27 members appointed to the steering committee, only one was a private-sector representative, while the remaining committee consists of public school administrators, institutional insiders, and state agency bureaucrats.
Furthermore, DPI’s legal counsel admitted in writing that the agency possesses no records, rubrics, or communications detailing how these committee members were chosen, where or when the group has met to ‘steer’ the effort, or what work it has actually done.
The lack of outside input and transparency comes after the agency faced tough questioning from lawmakers earlier this year over its standard-setting process. State Representative Amanda Nedweski (R-Pleasant Prairie), who chairs the Assembly Committee on Government Operations, Accountability, and Transparency, previously led a public hearing where she pressed DPI officials about using insulated panels to set critical academic benchmarks. At the time, Nedweski criticized DPI for finalizing student policies without public involvement, calling their reliance on third-party vendors “mind-blowing.”
Nedweski took aim at DPI’s leadership again after learning about the makeup of the new “Portrait” committee.
“Under Jill Underly’s leadership, a whopping two-thirds of Wisconsin fourth graders cannot read or perform basic math at grade level, yet she dodges accountability by hiding behind third-party consultants who she paid millions in taxpayer dollars to lower academic standards and rob our children of their future,” Nedweski told Dairyland Sentinel.
Ver Velde said a new look at graduate preparedness is necessary, noting that workforce concerns are widespread among Wisconsin businesses.
“Almost 60 percent of respondents to the WMC Employer Survey say that the top obstacle to finding workers is the lack of skilled applicants,” she said. “Even more concerning is that 64 percent of employers say they have employees that struggle to read or do math.”
These findings contrast sharply with DPI’s decision, steered by apparently hand-picked educational insiders, to prioritize “portrait” concepts like “global citizenship” and “self-awareness” over core academic skills. Critics and education advocates have increasingly questioned why the agency launched a resource-heavy initiative while the state’s reading and math proficiency rates remain low.
Nedweski shared those concerns, criticizing the agency for shutting out employers.
“Instead of listening to employers on what they need in a graduate, we have a fake steering committee of academic elitists and sheltered bureaucrats,” Nedweski said. “We certainly don’t need them to tell us what skills are needed in the real world – we are the ones living in it.”
WMC tracks career readiness and the state’s workforce pipeline closely.
“Wisconsin employers have been clear that the skills gap in Wisconsin is putting us at an economic disadvantage,” Ver Velde said. “But yet, when it came time for the Department of Public Instruction to launch the ‘Portrait of a Graduate’ initiative, they failed to include a robust representation of employers on the steering committee.”
We’ll have more as this story continues to develop.
